Look East For A Glimpse Of The Future

Note from Anastasia: This is the first of hopefully weekly posts from Paul MacGregor.

Paul's bio: Paul MacGregor is an Englishman based in Singapore. Paul runs threebillion.com, a web-based news feed dedicated to the business behind youth culture. The site takes a global view on youth and follows what they're up to and what businesses are trying to sell them. Previous to threebillion, Paul worked within the MTV teams in Europe and Asia. He is part of the other threebillion people on this planet who are over 25. You can contact Paul here.

I love stats. Try some of these for size:

Fifty-seven percent of the world's population live in Asia and 47% of Asia's population are under 25 years old. Or to put it another way, 1/4 of the world's population are under 25 and live in Asia (Source: US Census Bureau).

The stats speak for themeselves, however young people in Asia have been long overlooked, very misunderstood and literally a world away from the supposed hot beds of youth culture in the United States and Europe. In reality, young people in Asia are a leading light for understanding youth across the world.

For the last 4 years, whilst the western world has been watching conflicts in the Middle East, Asian countries have been untangling their political systems and building their economic prosperity at a dramatic pace. Young people in Asia are now in a position where they have the personal freedom and the cash-money to express themselves.

So if eastern and western youth are now on a semi-par, what makes Asian youth more interesting than western youth? Simply, technology. The comprehension and use of technology is generally more prevalent amongst young Asians. There are many reasons why, but here are some case studies that will show you how:

China's billion dollar online gaming industry
50% of 15-19 year old Singaporeans run their own blogs
Pimped out mobile phones in South Korea

All three stories have one overarching theme, the lives of young Asians are being defined by technology. It is not something extra young people are doing to fill in their spare time, technology has become symbiotic to their life. Whilst western media and marketing professionals are running around building MySpace pages because everyone else is doing it, taking time to look east uncovers tried and tested examples of what everybody's future will really look like.

You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.